Gas turbine engine combustor air swirlers are exposed to a hot, corrosive environment. It is therefore necessary that they be fabricated of special high temperature alloys. Conventionally employed swirler manufacturing techniques include casting and/or milling combined with subsequent machining steps such as drilling and deburring. Due to the aerodynamic function of the component, care is required to ensure a suitable air flow is produced through the device. However, the special materials employed are not easily cast nor machined. A major disadvantage of casting lies in the difficulty of attaining the close tolerances required for the type of metallic seals involved.
Still further, most swirlers include critical guide air metering holes that are typically drilled one by one; thus, entailing a lengthy time consuming process that is expensive. Also, substantial effort is involved in deburring the holes which further increases costs. Not only does manual finishing considerably raise costs and require great precision to complete, but the result is variable due to its manual nature. It can be concluded that conventional machining, drilling and finishing operations for manufacturing combustor swirlers are time and cost ineffective. Consequently, the swirlers are undesirably expensive to manufacture by conventional means. Therefore, opportunities for cost-reduction exist.